I am working on a story collection (tentatively titled GOOD SUFFERING), composed of both short stories and novellas/novelletes, and this is something I am concurrently assembling as I work on my next novel-length work, THE BODY IS A MACHINE THAT MAKES GHOSTS.

I do not know when GOOD SUFFERING will be finished, but I suspect it will be at least a year or two, if not longer. At last count, there are around 30 stories outlined for this project. Most of these stories will be original to the collection, though a few will be reprints, like my story “The Part That Dies,” which was included in Silent Motorist Media’s anthology MANNEQUIN: TALES OF WOOD MADE FLESH. I suspect a couple more anthology reprints, as I have a couple irons in that type of fire but these submissions are, at the time of my writing this post, still in acceptance/rejection limbo.

Another reprint will be the novella OCTOBER ANIMALS, which I will be making available in a very limited format, next year, as a part of Don Noble and I’s 5th anniversary of owning and operating Rooster Republic Press and its imprint Strangehouse Books. Details are still a bit up in the air, but i suspect the print run to be a max of 100 copies, probably only 75 will be available to order online. Hardcover, for sure, with original art. Some copies will likely include some combo of signature and limited art print, probably included as an oversized signature plate. Early stages for these finer details, and all that.

And if you’re interested, here is a brief synopsis:

Friends desperate to escape their small town concoct a Halloween heist, but their scheme drops them in the path of a monstrous local legend, in OCTOBER ANIMALS.

If you’ve read either of my previous short story collections, then you might remember a gigantic turtle, Chomp Chomp, who lives in the Mississippi River (and occasionally makes off with the locals). The “monstrous local legend” mentioned in the synopsis? One and the same.

Been dreaming up this tale for quite a while, now, and I am eager to start getting it down. Aiming for about 20K-to-30K words. I’ll be illustrating this one, which will be a first for me. I have never illustrated any of my own work.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to talking about OCTOBER ANIMALS a bit more over the next several months. I don’t expect pre-orders to go live until late spring or early summer, with an intended fall 2021 release.

Here’s to the giant monsters that eat us all, in the end, may they be magnificent, may their carnage be stupendous.

Cheers, everybody, and thanks for reading.